Before the year 2015 comes to a formal close, I have made a commitment to write one last blog entry. I wrote this one between the 30th to the 31st of December, which are legal holidays in my native Philippines and therefore a whole lot of free time and desire for me to write this one. Let me start by saying that in one of my self-study sessions in screenwriting, I realized one important thing about being a screenwriter: I must keep on writing in order to keep myself going, lest my skills would fall into disuse and stagnation over time. This thought led me to finally make my first blog entry after goodness knows how much time has passed me by, clouded by laziness, procrastination, and any other lame excuse anyone could think of under the sun (except of course for a heavy workload that virtually sapped the life out of me).
I recall that I've promised to myself before that I'll be writing here right now about one brutal weekend, particularly October 3 to 4, wherein three of my favorite teams all ended up losing in heartbreaking fashion. First to take the fall were the undersized but gallant, overachieving Gilas Pilipinas, who dropped a heartbreaking, highly-controversial 67-78 setback at the hands of tall, athletic China in the just-concluded FIBA Asia Championship. Next to take the fall were the Ateneo Lady Eagles at the hands of UAAP rival National University Lady Bulldogs in the Finals of the Shakey's V-League Collegiate Conference. (I managed to watch Games 2 and 3 of that championship series live, and the Lady Eagles regretfully weren't in their usual deadly element without Coach Tai Bundit, who was in his native Thailand for a prior commitment that time.) Lastly, the Ateneo Blue Eagles lost to UAAP blood rival De La Salle Green Archers, although the former were able to exact revenge on the latter a few weeks later. And as if those weren't enought salt into my wounds, the Philippine Azkals lost to now fellow also-rans Bahrain and Yemen on October 13 and November 12, respectively, during their 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification efforts. The losses effectively eliminated them from further contention for one of four automatic Asian slots to the 2018 tournament, meaning the country has to wait for at least another four years before being able to see the light of that highly prestigious tournament for the first time ever.
I once contemplated of writing a separate entry for those aforementioned events. However, due to lack of inspiration and the sheer heartache I experienced from those debacles, I eventually decided against doing so. And in its place comes this entry, which is sort of a diversion from my past entries as this has something to do with a very recent event not related to sports. This is about none other than Pia Wurtzbach, the reigning Miss Universe 2015. In case I haven't informed you yet, I'm probably one of those rare straight men who is a fan of all three B's we Filipinos in general are truly passionate about: basketball, boxing, and beauty pageants. In short, I'm passionate about virtually anything that could give honor and recognition to my beloved Philippines.
This year's Miss Universe was held on the morning of December 21, Manila time. I was very busy at that time, which was why I didn't get to watch the telecast live until its latter stages. I don't see the need to elaborate on the events further as practically the whole world knows by now what transpired during the pageant's concluding stages. As I have already mentioned in one of my most recent Facebook posts, the win may have been tainted by that bit of controversy, but a win is still a win for our beloved Philippines no matter what. However, I do also feel sad for Ariadna Gutiérrez and the rest of her fellow Colombians and the close-knit Latino community in general for what happened. It's somewhat like her reaching the summit of Mount Everest, only for her to be shoved hard back down the steep slope shortly afterwards.
Perhaps out of plain curiosity and sheer interest in an event that has put the Philippines in the international news radar once again, I have been scouring through the web about the event for a few days now. By doing so, I realized that the controversy could be some sort of a blessing in disguise as it unmasked many of Pia's fellow contestants and exposed them for the bitter, jealous sore losers that they truly are behind their pretty faces. I would neither elaborate on the things they did nor name names here, and I'll just leave it up to you peeps to find them out for yourselves. Whether this hatred is rooted in racism (God forbid, this behavior is totally unacceptable in a civilized society) or just plain bitterness is immaterial. The damage has been done, and such behavior had the judges, especially Perez Hilton, claiming that they have made the right choice to have kind, humble Pia crowned as the rightful winner all along. A netizen by the username djinn123 aptly put it:
Seeing the blunder as an opening to bash the winner, all the bitter losers are crawling out of the woodwork, exposing their true colors to the world- how unprofessional, artificial, and superficial they are! Aren't we glad these women did not win?
All things being said, I would still like to give Ariadna and the rest of the competing ladies so much credit for giving our local bet one hell of a fight to make her prove to the world that she deserved to win the crown.
Moving over to the positive side of the spectrum, the controversy also served to reveal the inner beauty of many of the ladies beneath their pretty faces. The world certainly found out who among the sea of beauties are our beloved girl's true friends who served as the wind beneath her wings during the most awkward moment anyone could possibly go through. Names are worth mentioning here this time. They include but may not be limited to the following ladies I have listed below based on the information I got online. I have also linked their names to their respective Instagram accounts for my fellow Filipinos who have Instagram accounts of their own in case they would like to drop by a message of thanks to these lovely ladies for their kind gesture towards our beloved Miss. (I hope I got all of their accounts right!) Okay, ready? Here they are:
Miss Israel Avigail Alfatov, Miss Malaysia Vanessa Tevi Kumares, Miss Myanmar May Barani Thaw, Miss Mauritius Sheetal Khadun, Miss Cayman Islands Tonie Chisholm, Miss British Virgin Islands Adorya Baly, Miss Lebanon Cynthia Samuel, Miss Norway Martine Rødseth, Miss Albania Megi Luka, Miss Belgium Annelies Törös, Miss Vietnam Phạm Thị Hương, Miss China Jessica Yun Fang Xue, Miss Sweden Paulina Brodd, Miss Georgia Janet Kerdikoshvili, Miss Russia Vladislava Evtushenko, Miss Austria Amina Dagi, Miss Great Britain Narissara France, Miss Finland Rosa-Maria Ryyti, Miss Nigeria Debbie Collins, and Miss Dominican Republic Clarissa Molina.
Whew! Those were quite a mouthful to mention. There are other names here that deserve special mention. First off, I would like to commend Miss Australia Monika Radulovic, who was among those who congratulated Pia and who later revealed in a now-viral interview with Australian morning program Sunrise that just about all of the contestants knew all along that Pia was the real winner when the teleprompter said, "Philippines, please take your first walk as Miss Universe" after Ariadna was crowned. This could be the reason why there was a near-deafening silence right after Ariadna was declared the winner. But for no apparent reason, many of the contestants turned a blind eye to the truth and insisted that Ariadna is still the true winner. They even had the gall to accuse Pia, not bumbling host Steve Harvey, of stealing the crown from Miss Colombia. But when asked how come it was Pia's fault, none of them could give a coherent answer to the question. Did everyone, including the four Miss Universe individual judges, smell bitterness and mob mentality here? No wonder why all of them lost in the first place.
Enough of the negativity. Second, Miss USA Olivia Jordan is also worthy of commendation. That so-called BFF act she demonstrated when Pia was declared the real winner is priceless.
Lastly, I reserve my third and last individual commendation for Miss Bulgaria Radostina Todorova. She may have been a clapper at the pageant, but she certainly showed she is a grand winner of a friend and supporter when she encouraged a then-hesitant Pia to march to the front stage to accept her crown once Mr. Harvey revealed the colossal boo-boo he had just made.
All of the contestants who warmly congratulated Pia on her win have won the hearts of Filipinos, especially those on my special mention list. In fact, one of them, Miss Bulgaria, even has a Facebook community page titled Miss Bulgaria Radostina Todorova for Miss World 2016 made specially for her by (apparently) a Filipino fan that appears to actively campaign for her to be trained by renowned beauty queen trainer, our very own Jonas Gaffud of Aces & Queens fame, so she could bring home the 2016 Miss World crown for her country. In case the training pushes through and Miss Bulgaria eventually wins the said crown, this would mark the very first time in history that her beloved country would win not only the coveted blue crown but also any Big Four crown. (For the uninitiated, the so-called Big Four beauty pageants are Miss Universe, Miss World, Miss Earth and Miss International.) This may come at the expense of whoever will represent our country at Miss World next year, but it would be perfectly okay with me and in fact I will be very supportive of it as a grateful reward for a lovely young woman from the Balkan state who came to the rescue of our beloved Miss Philippines.
Those beautiful ladies who came to support our Queen P may not have won the Miss Universe title, but with such class act they displayed, they emerged proud winners in their own right and have thus proven to their respective countries that they all made the right choice as to who would best represent them on the global stage. And well, before I know it, this entry appears to have surpassed my target length. I'm afraid I will have to cut this piece short and publish its continuation in about a week from now. For now, I would like to say congratulations to Pia Wurtzbach and all the Pinay beauty queens who once more gave honor to our country this year as well as Pia's fellow Miss Universe contestants who stood by her in her time of need. Happy new year to everyone!
